three hundred
by seleneswan
Summary: To be brave is to love unconditionally. —Sasuke/Sakura.
1. (sunrise)

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**three  
hundred**

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Leaning against the door of the Hokage's office, Sakura watched fondly as Naruto raced around frantically, trying to find the papers for his early morning meeting over the reallocation of the recently liquidated Uchiha lands.

Mumbling to himself, he sorted through the various stacks of paperwork on the large expanse of his desk. "I could have sworn the financials were in—"

"They're in your hand," she pointed out, fighting the smile that threatened to slip out.

He paused, looking down at the bundle he was carrying. "Oh."

Laughing outright now, Sakura echoed him. "_Oh_, indeed."

"I don't know what I'd do without you, Sakura-chan."

Still light hearted, she continued. "Well, we'd never know how much Sasuke's donated estate is worth or where the money went. Which would mean we'd be robbing some very hopeful families of a new home."

Naruto nodded, counting the folders in his hands.

"I'm sorry I can't be there."

Naruto looked up, then, completely serious. "Are you kidding me? Sakura, what you're doing is much more important than adding some numbers with a bunch of old people."

She fidgeted for a slight moment, staring very intently at the carpet. "I suppo—"

"Sakura, you're shaping the future."

A lopsided smile, not quite reaching her eyes but _almost_ there twitched to her lips. "Well when you put it that way…"

"You're the best thing that's ever happened to the Academy curriculum. It's not like you're not telling them that war is the worst thing that a person could grow up in or that we've sacrificed the world in exchange for peace. You're telling them that in the end what really matters is their comrades and friends. Their _team. _Their _family._

"You're telling them our story so they _know_ how important it is to value the people around them or else they might lose them," Naruto said very seriously, putting the folders down on his desk and walking over, squeezing her hands in his larger ones.

"And _that_ is much more important than learning how to aim a kunai or make a clone…and _certainly_ more important than signing some papers for a few hours," he finished, looking at her pointedly.

Sakura loosened her hands from his, smiling all of a sudden. "You're right."

He straightened, then, arms behind his head, a grin spreading across his face again. "'Course I'm right. I'm always right."

Sakura cracked her knuckles thoughtfully, a product of years of habit before looking up, eyes warm. "Let's not delude ourselves, now, Hokage-sama," Sakura teased.

Naruto pouted playfully, dodging when Sakura tried to pinch his cheeks. "You _always _do that and it _hurts_—" he whined.

"Good," she interrupted.

"But—"

"If I wasn't here to give you grief, nobody else would. Hinata's too nice. I don't know how she puts up with you," Sakura commented, strolling airily to the window.

Naruto sighed, returning to his desk. "It's because I'm fantastic in bed," he boasted, picking up the bundle of files.

"Oh, _ew_, Naruto. I do not need to _know_—"

"No secrets between teammates, Sakura," he interrupted in a sing song voice, ducking just in time as a crumpled up piece of paper sailed past his head.

Sakura shrugged. "Two can play at that game. So last week, I had my period—"

"_No! Sakura_—"

"—which means that this Wednesday I'll be ovulating—"

Naruto clapped two hands over his ears, dropping everything he was carrying instantly, cursing. "Fuck, Sakura! You made your point!"

"No secrets between teammates, Naruto," she replied cheekily.

He sighed, only thankful for the abrupt stop in uterine talk. Quick to change the topic lest Sakura go on just for kicks, he began. "So the meeting will probably last a few hours to sort out the legalities of the passing of property to the state, but after that, ramen?"

Sakura watched him kneel and collect all the fallen papers, considering. "I feel like there's something I had to do today…oh! Oh, Team 7 reunion lunch, silly! We're going to the new café that opened near Ino's."

Naruto visibly perked up. "Do they serve ramen?"

She looked at him incredulously. "Seriously?"

"It's a legitimate question!"

She shook her head, exasperated. "I'm going to head out, I think. Class starts soon, and I want to see Sasuke-kun before I go."

Naruto hummed noncommittally, nodding as he stood up from the ground.

Sakura grinned, pressing a fond, light kiss to his cheek before slipping out the door but not before yelling behind her. "You'd better not be late for lunch! Sai's _promised_ he'll come this time."

Naruto chuckled, raking a hand through his hair, contemplative, and watched as the sun rose steadily across the Konoha horizon.

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* * *

**notes**: BEWARE HUGE AUTHOR'S NOTE AHEAD. You should probably read it, though. It'll be beneficial to you.

So for once in my life, I have something planned out. This is going to be about fifteen chapters, I think, and is…going to be _vastly_ different from my usual fic.

—

Also, I have some blanket thank-yous to dole out: Thanks to Nicole, for working out my fears with me. And Les, for all the encouragement in the world and for feeding my inner sadist because you _always_ need someone to feed your inner sadist.

Thanks to Sakura's Unicorn, who leaves me the most amazing reviews in the world, and whose reassurance is a huge reason why this fic is rated M, even if she doesn't know it. (Now you do, dear. Now you do.)

Extra thanks to everyone who's ever read my crap, and anyone who ever will. I hope you'll enjoy reading this as much as I'll love writing it.

—

(And yes, the chapters will get longer, but they'll only get as long as I want them to be. Don't question the chapter length: it's beginning to be a pet peeve. I have my reasons. Just trust me on the word length.)

(I love you all!)


	2. ye

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**three  
hundred**

**[**six years earlier**]**

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_I do not love you for your_  
_strength and grit,—_

___—_

Twelve had never been as simple as a state of mind.

It had taken Sakura many long years to learn that, to understand that she would not apologize for what she once was…because that twelve year old girl would always be part of her.

Sakura had a great deal of regrets at the age of sixteen, but committing herself so fully to love at such a young age had never been one of them.

It never had been, and it never would be.

At sixteen, Sakura's love was a quiet, unassuming kind. She knew that she was passionate and fierce, and she didn't need anyone's validation to know that this was part of her being, that these traits were the makeup of her very soul.

She wore her heart on her sleeve, and she wore it with pride. It had taken some time, but she had learned that what drove her was her emotion.

And the thought that these bonds she'd created made her strong, was the last, fleeting thought that slipped through her mind before she tore the ground open in a way she never had before.

Her gloved knuckles against the rough dirt, the explosion of rock, and the gaping crack in the earth just beneath the Juubi, deep enough, wide enough, and sudden enough to sink the beast hundreds of meters while the Kages finished off the job within the barrier.

Her clothes were stained with the sweat of something so close to a victory when she knew that love, despite what many jaded warriors would tell her, was what gave her the will to survive. To fight.

"Tsunade-shishou…" she whispered to no one, the wind and crumble of dirt louder than her thoughts, worried for the health of her teacher.

She allowed herself a second's worth of reprieve as the legacy of her master swept through her veins, the rumbling crash of the beast falling to its knees the only applause she needed. She was sure this was the only glory she needed—the knowledge that those on the other side of her fissure were _safe_.

She glanced up, the blur of black and white along the corners of her vision against the dark sky, heavy with unfallen rain.

Sasuke.

He'd appeared out of the blue, and somehow Sakura found it in herself to be surprised, to mouth his name in shock…while he'd explained he was on their side.

And just like that, they were Team Seven again. As if they'd never parted in the first place.

It was blur how they'd entered the fray together, and even more so how he and Naruto had somehow, wordlessly, as if the years they'd been apart had never happened, developed a plan.

A plan between exchanged glances was created, and the certain sync in all of their movements was telltale that they knew each other. And the brief conversation and the heavy glance she'd shared with Sasuke was enough for her to fall into place on this chessboard they called war.

To place Team Seven in the history books forever.

"We're not looking for fame," she'd chided, reminding Naruto. "We're here to protect our precious people."

But the eagerness on his face couldn't be denied and somehow in this bloody haze that had been the past few weeks, a true and genuine smile split her face when he'd joked. "Easy for you to say. You've already done both."

It was strange, how the small reunion and the soft chuckle from Sasuke was enough, suddenly, for her. Enough for the world.

They were her family.

The evening blackened into night, the sky clouding up, swollen with water. And the time for small banter and small victories was over as the only one left was Madara…and they were the ones who had to finish him.

He was as evasive as ever, but the sky beckoned, and Sasuke was never one to resist.

He looked at her once—a look that she'd never forget, searing with some kind of unspoken promise—before tipping his face upwards. Standing just behind Madara, he summoned the bolt of lightning to his palm, hot and dangerous. It was in that moment that Sakura knew that this was too dangerous, that Sasuke was _too close_, that he would get hurt, too, and badly—

The protest formed at her lips, and Sasuke looked as if to angle the bolt at _Naruto_, the gleam of approval in Madara's eyes visible even from across the way.

"Do it," the older man hissed.

But he didn't.

In that brief second of the change in trajectory, Madara grabbed Sasuke's free wrist, and a raw scream, hoarse and desperate ripped from Sakura's throat because she _knew _exactly what he was trying to do.

And just as the barely murmured plan entailed, Sasuke slammed the bolt into Madara's chest as the crack of thunder rumbled across the sky, and it began to pour in sheets.

With blood seeping through his barely parted lips, Madara let out his last few words, gaze murderous as he glared at Sasuke, thoroughly electrocuted as well, convulsing next to him. "If I'm going down, you're going with me," Madara said between gritted teeth.

Madara was paralyzed when Naruto finished him off with a rasenshuriken, the spatter of blood on the ground the only trophy they'd ever get.

And the two boys, _her _boys, collapsed to their knees around a dead man.

Sakura had never recalled running faster.

When she reached Sasuke, his heart was beating wildly out of control, his hands gripping his chest, a grimace of pain on his face. Naruto's hands were raw and burned from overusing chakra, and the large laceration down his side was proof that the battle had been more than its ending.

The air tasted like ashes, and Sakura herself was incredibly low on chakra when she pressed her hands, one on each chest, and began to heal.

The sky was dark, and the only light around for miles was the sudden burst of chakra and the green glow, constant and everlasting, of her mending.

It wasn't long until Sasuke was unconscious but still so alive, his heart under control, beating steadily under her hand. It wasn't long until Naruto's bleeding was staunched, the wound patched over with new skin, and Sakura was pale from exhaustion.

Only when she was sure all three of them were feasibly _alive_ did she allow herself to crumple onto the muddy earth between them, empty of everything, water drops tangling in her eyelashes.

And in that moment, Sakura knew that she would never let anyone tell her that healing was a useless art. Nobody would ever try and convince her that this was worthless.

Not when it brought her broken team back.

—

Sakura awoke to Tsunade looming over her, gaze critical.

"What?" were the first words that made it past her parched lips in a croak, and Tsunade didn't answer, instead pressing a straw to her student's lips, the silent message evident. _Drink_.

No liquid could ever come close to matching water, she knew, in those moments where she greedily sipped. It was more than clear, nearly tasteless liquid—it was life.

She exhaled as the cup drained, licking her lips thoughtfully. Her gaze refocused then, on the lines forming between Tsunade's eyebrows, the furrow of displeasure clear. "What?" she repeated, words much smoother now.

"I told you not to use it so recklessly."

Understanding lit Sakura's face, and sitting up more fully now, she pursed her lips. "No, you said to only use it in emergency situations."

"There were people coming, it would have been—"

"That's not a guarantee. All I knew is that they were dying—Sasuke _especially_; Tsunade-sama, he was so close to the end—and I was running out of chakra, and Naruto was bleeding out and I don't ever really know how much the Kyuubi can fix, especially after battle…"

Tsunade rocked back on her heels, sighing.

"You gave me the Yin Seal as a backup when I needed it the most. And I think—no, I know they were worth it."

Tsunade stepped away from the bed, walking towards the window.

Sakura ducked her head, beginning to inspect the bandages wrapped around her previously shattered knuckles, the chakra burns on her own fingers.

"I'm proud of you," Tsunade said suddenly, staring at the Hokage monument, just visible in the early morning light.

Sakura looked up, startled, before staring intently at her lap again. "I…"

"Make no mistake—I still think what you did was incredibly foolish and left you in such a vulnerable place, running yourself out of _all_ chakra like that. But…it was also incredibly brave." Tsunade said brusquely, crossing her arms as she turned to face her student slowly.

Lips twitching with words she couldn't form, Sakura's green eyes grew glassy. "I…thank you."

Tsunade smiled fondly, closing the distance between them by stroking her cheek fondly. "Yeah, yeah."

—

When Sakura awoke again, it was to the sound of her hospital door slamming and a haggard Naruto rushing to her side.

"Naruto!" she breathed, hands already reaching out, patting him down to make sure that he was completely whole and uninjured. "Are you okay? Shouldn't you be resting?"

"I'm fine," he said, slapping her seeking hands away lightly. "Sakura-chan, listen to me."

Confused, she drew back. "Naruto, I don't…if you're okay, then what are you doing here? It's against hospital protocol for patients to be wandering...and it's—" she glanced quickly at the clock on the wall, "—nearly three in the morning!"

"Sakura-chan I have to—"

"Sleep! Rest! Heal!" she finished his sentence sternly, grabbing his ear roughly despite his howling protests as she pushed back the blankets, fully intending to march him back down to his room. "And don't you even _think_ I won't report this. _And_ post better guards outside of your room…" she muttered darkly, stalking over to the door, not caring how the back of the hospital gown exposed her floral panties from the back.

"No! This is important! You have to listen—"

She yanked the door open, the hall's bright light spilling into her darkened room. Pointing roughly down the hall, she bit out. "Let's go."

"_Sakura." _Naruto urged, setting his hands on her shoulders, stilling her movements. "It's about Sasuke."

All of her ire faded, her abrasive grip on his ear weakening as her hand fell back to her side limply. Eyes wide and still standing in the doorway, all she could manage was the whispered, "…what?"

"He's in jail."

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* * *

**notes**: I feel like I owe a lot of you an apology because you were all so eager to see the first chapter continue where it left off...and I'm afraid I've done exactly the opposite of that. As opposed to working forward from where we started...we've gone six years backwards and will be working forward from _here_ to get back to the time we were at in chapter one.

In flashback, essentially.

Also, the italicized bits at the top for the rest of the chapters are part of a truly beautiful poem that I feel fits_ three hundred_ very well. It's called "Civil War" by tumblr user sincerelyjoanna. And if you stick around to the end you'll have read the whole thing in pieces, a bit in every chapter.

IN OTHER NEWS CAN WE GET A CELEBRATION?! CHAPTER 631 AM I RIGHT _AM I RIGHT?! _KDLFJSKJFS.

Thank you for all your kind words and enthusiasm! I love you all so much.


	3. shall

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**three**  
**hundred**

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_—for your set jaw,—_

_—_

Sometimes waiting was just as hard as war.

There was an uncomfortable sensation in not being able to do anything, to be stuck in this strange limbo where the heart lay somewhere else and the mind was all too active to make up for it.

Sakura knew full well how difficult it was, as a medic, to walk out amongst the many chairs and watch as each face turned up, full of unfulfilled hope and sorrow, waiting for some kind of news that only you could deliver. She knew how hard it was to have to crush that hope with bitter reality, and knew even better how exhilarating it was to watch a bright smile rip through a face when you gave them exactly what they wanted and more.

But until now, Sakura had never been one of those faces.

She was more than friendly with the inside of an operating room. The rush and the adrenaline and the focus were feelings she was familiar with. The gurneys of metal and the clink of glass vials of maybe-cures, the murmurs that echoed on the precipice of life and death.

These were all her close allies, the things she nurtured hope in when she found herself elbows deep in organs and bones, lifeblood seeping slowly away from yet another human being as she repaired the unrepairable.

Behind the doors of the emergency ward, for a brief second, Sakura got to play god.

It was thrilling.

(It was terrifying.)

But the truth was that this idleness was so much worse. At least on the other side of those doors, she could _do _something, be sucked out of her own head and have some semblance of control and reassurance of the situation.

But here, with Sasuke at the mercy of another pair of hands just beyond those doors…

Perhaps waiting was harder.

_—_

"Tsunade-shishou, _please—_"

Said woman turned around, hands on her hips, stern as ever. "Sakura, you are well aware of hospital policy. I've bent the rules for you many times, but I cannot let you play doctor over your teammate."

Looking frustrated, Sakura rubbed her hands over her face tiredly. "But I've operated over Naruto dozens of times! And I already healed Sasuke-kun on the battlefield! I know his injuries better than anyone!"

Tsunade shot her a hard glance. "Naruto is _not_ an international criminal. The fact that Naruto _not_ was in jail answering questions before he was checked over and shut up in his hospital room is proof enough of that. Uchiha spent 24 hours in a jail cell. I can't be blind to the bigger issue at hand here. Just trust me."

"But isn't there _anything_ I can do?"

"Sakura," she sighed heavily, her tone resigned. "This situation is more than just you and your team; if I show leniency towards you over a person you care about who _happens_ to be on the hit list of nearly every Kage out there, I'll have another war on my hands. This is politics. I'm sorry, but I can't let you treat him."

Sakura picked at the scabs on her knuckles as she mulled this over in the silence. "Can we at least see him?"

Tsunade softened at the decidedly dejected posture of her prized pupil. Walking back over to her desk chair, she settled herself in it before reaching in a drawer and pulling out two glasses and a bottle of alcohol, uncorking the top and pouring a generous portion for each of them.

"Drink up, kiddo. War's hard, but the aftermath's worse."

Sakura took the glass and swished the pearlescent liquor around, considering. "Will we ever see him?"

Tsunade pursed her lips. "I'll do my damndest to try," she promised.

Sakura looked up, eyes hopeful. "Okay," she nodded determinedly, and then took a swig of sake. "Okay."

_—_

The proof was not in the pudding. In fact, nothing was in the pudding except for a spoon and the smell of hospital. And Naruto's saliva.

Typical.

"So why's he in there, anyways?" Naruto spoke between mouthfuls of hospital chocolate pudding. "I thought you already fixed him up all good."

Sakura shook her head, poring over a textbook for the treatments for lightning related injuries, but the entries were entirely unhelpful in determining the likelihood of any of the injuries occurring. 6% did this and some people reported this but it's never been _seen_ and 4 out of 17 people experienced this syndrome and got x, y, and z problems. One time, person C lost all of their memories.

And that doesn't even begin to get into the necrotic tissue.

Sakura wasn't sure if the ugly feeling inside of her was the sudden need to vomit last night's meager hospital supper or the absolute dread of the sheer number of ailments Sasuke could have gained. Maybe it was both.

Lightning just wasn't as clear cut as fire. You could only get so many burn types—first, second, or third degree. You lost what the fire touched. Simple. Easy. Logic.

Lightning was too unpredictable.

A bitter smile contorted her face as she realized the strange irony—could she even call it that?—in that the most unpredictable person she knew who wielded the unpredictable element with prowess landed himself in the emergency ward as a result of it.

With a heavy sigh, she shut the book and buried her face in her arms, the cool wood of the table pressed against her forehead.

"I fixed what was immediately life threatening. All I did was revive dead heart cells and dead heart muscle. I got his heart to beat steadily again so he wouldn't kill other parts of his body from a lack of oxygen. He was going through cardiac arrest when I got to him, so that was what I fixed." she replied finally, muffled by her sleeves.

Naruto nodded, "Yeah, so he's fine—"

Looking up, Sakura shot him a flat look. "There's a difference between being alive and being fine. Naruto, he was hit by his own lightning. I did enough to save his life, but the extent of his injuries is going to be immense. Just because a shinobi can control an element does not make him impervious to it."

He froze at that, glancing at her pinched face, and set the plastic cup and spoon down slowly. "…what all is going to be wrong with him?"

Sakura shook her head. "I don't know. Anything. Everything. Lightning is…" she trailed off, mutely dismayed. "He could be paralyzed. He could have his limbs amputated. He could have died so, so easily." Wild eyed, she stared Naruto down. "Do you know what happens when lightning strikes a tree?"

He blinked at the sudden change in topic. "Uh. No?"

"It _explodes_."

Naruto blanched.

"When it strikes a person, sometimes it's not as merciful."

Brow furrowed and deeply concerned, he tried to pick apart her sentence. "Whaddya mean?" he said finally.

Bottle green irises were troubled when she finally looked him in the eye. "Sometimes, I think the finality of death is better than struggling angrily through some kind of half-life."

_—_

That was the first night that Sakura was allowed to return to her own home.

The time on her wrist read six forty two, the sky was cloudy, and the air was humid. It was going to rain again—of that, she was certain—and she was grateful. Konoha could use a cleansing, she thought to herself, remembering all too well everyone covered in the red of warfare.

_She_ could use some cleansing. Maybe her home, too, for that matter.

It was because she was busy contemplating the state of her apartment, abandoned and dusty, that she didn't notice the whispers.

But as she came to the curve in the road, began the stretch past the ramen stand—that was when she heard the shouting, and everything she'd been subconsciously blocking flowed in, unbidden and swelling through her ears, a surge of muffled conversations and commentary.

But above it all, the yelling of her best friend. It was automatic, the direction her feet took her, the way her hands parted the folds, the way she arrived just in time to clasp a hand around the crook of Naruto's elbow, dragging him outside despite his protests.

"Stop it," she hissed, seething. "What in the world are you doing, arguing with strangers?"

Genuine anger flashed on Naruto's usually happy-go-lucky face, and Sakura took a step back as he breathed heavily, and finally, in a hoarse voice, said, "They were talking about stuff they don't know _anything _about."

"Wha—"

"You haven't heard it?" he snarled. "The _shit_ they've been spouting about Sasuke? Dangerous, needs to be taken care of, not welcome here, traitor, _terrorist_—" he mimicked, face twisting into something ugly.

"Naruto—"

"THEY WANT HIM _DEAD_," his shout turned more than a few heads, and a mother across the way ushered her children inside a building, eyeing him warily. He looked hopelessly at Sakura, and then this, in a hurt whisper: "They all do."

A distant rumble echoed in the sky, and looking into Naruto's blue, sorrowful eyes, Sakura could swear she felt Sasuke's unsteady heartbeat under her open palm again. Her fingers clenched.

—

The next morning, it was vanilla, the Hokage's office, and a spoon being waved around like a weapon.

"But I don't understand why he was in jail before he was in the hospital; the bastard's life was in danger!"

"Get out, Naruto. And stop dripping pudding all over my desk. That's not even for you. You're healed and fine; that's for _actual _hospital patients."

Pointing aggressively at the bandages around his torso, his jaw set in stubbornness, he countered. "I have gauze and tape all over me. I still count."

Even Sakura, who was slumped in the chair that Naruto was no longer occupying, looked exceedingly fed up with the whole situation, some kind of helplessness and frustration and overwhelming tiredness coloring her face.

"How is interrogation more important than health, anyways, Baa-chan?!"

Crabbily, Tsunade muttered a low curse under her breath, and hung her head. "Look. As much as it looks like it, I _don't_ have control over everything that goes on in this village."

Sakura sat up at this, and her gaze slid over to Naruto who was, surprisingly, silent.

Taking a sip of her early morning tea, Tsunade exhaled, sounding decidedly bugged. "From what I understand, Iwa nin collected you three from the battlefield. They turned you over Homura and Koharu who were still in the village at the time. You two were shipped to the hospital, and Uchiha ended up in an interrogation room, and when he 'didn't cooperate,' he was sent to a jail cell. Ibiki found out what had happened and found Uchiha unconscious in his cell. End of story."

Sakura leaned forward. "Unconscious?"

"Lightning, Sakura. I'm sure you've read up on it already," the blonde woman said, leveling her apprentice with a knowing look.

Sakura's lips pressed together, and she stood from her chair suddenly, turning to walk out of the room.

The door clicked shut quietly, and Naruto ducked his head, throat tight, palms flat on the desk in front of him. And for some reason beyond his level of understanding, his eyes burned with almost tears. Bitter bile rose up in his throat and he shook his head rapidly as if trying to dispel some ugly visage.

"I'm gonna change this," he said gruffly, then. "When I become Hokage, I'm gonna change all of this. This…this isn't right."

And then he turned around, roughly shoving the chair out of his way, sending it toppling to the ground with a loud clatter, and followed suit, closing the door behind him with unsettlingly soft quiet.

The chair was not righted until four hours later.

—

The nurse's words echoed in her head, giving her the full layout of the diagnosis. Cardiopulmonary arrest, kissing burns, feathering burns, blackened fingers, temporary keraunoparalysis in his legs, a dislocated shoulder, and something like anterograde amnesia.

Sakura's eyes pricked with tears, and she buried her head in her hands.

Naruto's hand shook her shoulder, persistently asking for an explanation, and she glossed over most of it, picking apart what he didn't know.

When she finished explaining that most of it is temporary but the anterograde amnesia may or may not last, there was tense silence between them. "Well, I've always been good at repeating myself," Naruto joked half-heartedly, palm rubbing circles into her back.

Her lips twitch upwards into a smile recalling all the times he'd told her that he was going to be Hokage or that he'd made the promise of a lifetime or even to go out for ramen.

And suddenly there was laughter bubbling at her lips, the memories of a lifetime behind her, and when Naruto joined her chuckles, she could've sworn that nothing felt warmer.

When they finally left the waiting room on summons of the Hokage, there was a smile on her face, and by the time they'd traversed the village center and opened the door to the office with a light knock, it was still in her eyes.

_—_

Kakashi was already waiting there when they arrived, looking haggard but all together whole, resting against the window. The hand raised in greeting was shaky at best but very _alive_.

Tsunade looked speculatively at Sakura for a long moment, at something that looked like burgeoning hope in those green eyes, and sighed, glancing briefly down at the many letters she'd received in the past few days.

"This is how it is: every Kage is calling for Uchiha's head. I know he did a lot for the war, but that doesn't change years of criminal activity across all of the countries, doesn't atone for the lives he's taken and threatened, and the leaders he's angered by gatecrashing their summit. It doesn't change the fact that his name is attached to every high priority international criminal in the book," she said, tapping the orange bingo book that rested on her desk. "They want me to execute him, and their rationale is that why take a chance of faith on someone who may endanger the world again?"

Team Seven's silence was heavy.

"But for all the transgressions that Konoha has made in the past, I want this village to finally be a fair one. He's going to have a trial, and it's going to be _hard_. There's a very real possibility that this won't work out, and nothing can change that. But if I'm willing to fight for justice," she said, a wry smile parting her face, "then you'd better be willing to fight for him."

Unsurprisingly, Naruto knocked back his chair again when he stood up purposefully, a cocky grin resting on his lips. "We fought for Sasuke for four years, Baa-chan. A couple more months can't hurt."

Kakashi's snort and Sakura's resounding watery laugh and determined nod were enough for Tsunade to know that even one member short, these were made for great things.

Thrusting one finger into the air, Naruto screeched like it was a war cry. "Let's get to it! The clock is ticking—we gotta save the bastard one last time."

Without picking up the fallen chair he rushed out of the room, Kakashi following lazily behind him, muttering something along the lines of _didn't he just get out of the hospital _and _where does all this energy come from_.

Sakura bent over to scoot the chairs back into position, picking up the one its side easily. "Thank you, Tsunade-shishou," she said, eyes wet. "Thank you."

"Ahh, don't leave just yet," she said, tutting when Sakura turned on her heel to follow them out. "I have a task for you."

Sakura blinked.

"Uchiha's going to be discharged tomorrow to return to his dingy cell. He's not _healed_ though, not in the way that is perfectly fine. He could still develop a number of injuries even months after being struck by lightning. Cataracts, arrhythmia, muscle loss, blindness…" she trailed off, as if listing symptoms from a textbook. "But Ibiki's going to want to interrogate him now that he's fully capable of answering questions."

Sakura squinted. "Are you asking me to—"

"He's going to be in cell 410. You will have high clearance. I don't want the last Uchiha to die in a jail cell from injuries that could have been cured by a capable medic. And because it deals with the Torture and Interrogation department, your name will be off the record."

Green eyes went wide. "Tsunade-shishou…"

Getting up from her chair behind the Hokage desk, she rummaged through a drawer on the other side of the room. "Here's your badge."

Slim arms were wrapped around her in an instant, a mass of pink hair trying to fuse itself with her shoulder. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."

Tsunade smiled. "You're welcome."

.

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* * *

**notes**: All right. So there's a lot of things I have to tell you so prepare yourself for a REALLY, REALLY LONG AUTHOR'S NOTE. I'M SORRY IN ADVANCE, BUT ALL OF THESE THINGS HAVE TO BE SAID.

1) Written for **sasusaku month;** day 9's prompt was "bugs" and I know they meant the creepy crawly kind but I chose to take it as the verb. Like, I'm bugged. You're bugged. He, she, it is bugged. As in bothered. Not as in the James Bond/Gallagher Girls/Liam Neeson types of bugs for spying.

2) MEDICAL STUFF! I DID A LOT OF RESEARCH FOR THIS CHAPTER. Actually, for the whole story, really. Three pages worth of research on the injuries that can be attained by being struck by lightning. I'll spare you the three pages, but I'll tell you this: I was _really, really _kind for Sasuke's injuries. They're going to seem horrifying, but they're rather kind in the grand scheme of potential problems. So I'm going to give you a step by step as to what's wrong with Sasuke.

His own jutsu was used against him. Kirin. Which is where he uses natural lightning kinda like Zeus. So essentially, yes, he was struck by lightning. Madara got the brunt, obviously, since the guy's dead, but Sasuke ended up hideously injured.

In this order, he got chest pain because he went into **cardiopulmonary arrest**. This is commonly mistaken for a heart attack, but that's different. This is just where a lot of your heart muscle dies or is greatly damaged. The scar tissue of which, if you live it, can lead to **arrhythmia** (uneven heartbeat). This is what Sakura fixed. She did magical medical justu and revived the heart tissue, so he's spotless in that way. She calmed his heart, made sure everything was stable, and that was where she stopped.

He acquired **"kissing burns"** which are basically these light red burns that look like they're innocuous but actually hide great underlying damage to the tissue. Also,** feathering burns**, which are spidery like lines that denote the passage of lightning through a body. These are harmless and occur to most lightning struck people, but you look like you have these spider webs or branches or something on your body. They're perfectly non harmful though. Google feathering burns! It's actually pretty cool.

His fingers, since that was how he controlled Kirin, were blackened and burned terribly.

He also has temporary **keraunoparalysis**. Keraunoparalysis means, literally, paralysis as a result of lightning. Not permanent, although it can be. His legs are immobile right now. The extremities of the body, the hands, the legs, etc, usually get this. They become cold and unresponsive for a while until the body gets its shit together and fixes you. It's very common among lightning-electrocuted people. 67% develop some form of it.

As a result, the treatment for that is to monitor his neurovascular status to make sure things are going back to normal. It means keeping an eye of the 5 P's (pain, pallor, pulse, paresthesia, and paralysis).

And lastly, what I didn't mention but will come up later, is that as a result, he's extremely susceptible to tetanus. Most people get a vaccine for this to go to school. The condition itself is where your skeletal muscle fibers contract for a very long time and leave you with conditions such as lockjaw, which is exactly what it sounds like.

And then there's the **anterograde amnesia**, which is basically where you're crap and remembering the recent past. If any of you have seen _Grey's Anatomy_, it's like when Izzie gets her surgery and can't remember anything for a while. People have to keep repeating stuff to her.

Sasuke's also at a risk for long term eye damage that will show up months later. He has a 6% chance of getting a cataract, which is where the lens of your eye gets all clouded up and blocks your vision.

And then there's one more thing that I won't mention right now because spoilers, but I'll explain it in the next chapter, hopefully.

NOW THAT I'VE EXPLAINED ALL OF THESE THINGS, DISCLAIMER: I'M NOT A DOCTOR. I'M NOT IN MED SCHOOL (nor do I ever plan to be). I KNOW WHAT I READ, BUT I'M NOT A RELIABLE SOURCE OF INFORMATION.

Great. Now that that's sorted.

3) I'd like to thank some lovely people: Les, for being a cutie patootie potoo. Nicole, for being up front with me and giving me information on solitary confinement. Miko, for reading my palms and (hopefully) for the conspiracy. Sonya, for being sweet. And to Sasuke and Sakura, who are going to be so canon it _hurts_. I BELIEVE.

Ahem.

4) I was going to say something here. Uh. Hi. I'm hungry.

5) OH I have found a definitive theme song instrumental thing that fits the mood of this for me, and I've been writing to it, so if you want to check it out: _your hand in mine_ by explosions in the sky. It's phenomenal.

5.5) CONGRATULATIONS IF YOU MADE IT THROUGH THIS LONGNESS HERE IS NOTHING BUT KNOWLEDGE. And my love. Always, my love.

6) Thank you for reading and for your encouragment. It's been such a pleasure to write this. (:


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